Buffer Zone: Phosphorus Cycle and Phosphorus Content in Surface Water

A
buffer zone is a natural border of vegetation that is left around bodies of water when
land is cleared. This natural vegetation acts as a filter by reducing the movement of sediment, pesticides, nutrients and fertilizers into water. In addition, a buffer zone aids in stabilizing the bank and provides shading and a food supply for fish. The width of a buffer depends on a variety of factors including soil characteristics, slope and the type/quality of fish habitat being protected. For further information, please consult the document, Best Management Practices for Riparian Zones in Newfoundland and Labrador.
Phosphorus cycle and phosphorus content in surface water

Phosphorus is an element that, while being essential to life as a key nutrient factor, nevertheless contributes to the eutrophication of lakes and other bodies of water. The phosphorus content in the Earth's crust is 9.3 .10-2 % by mass and it is not encountered in a free state in nature. All phosphorus-containing minerals (their number being about 190) are orthophosphates and are distributed in the magmatic and sedimentary rocks. The most important of them are the apatites and phosphorites (Figure 3.5) Figure 3.5 Phosphorus cycle
Phosphorus is assimilated by plants in the form of salts of the phosphoric acid and is of great importance for functioning of all living organisms, since it enters the composition of ADP and ATP (adenosine triphosphate), DNA and RNA. From all the mineral elements assimilated by plants, only phosphorous could be considered to be deficient because it is found in practically insoluble compounds in acidic and alkaline soils. The phosphorus cycle in the biosphere is incomplete, water being the main reason for this, because phosphorus migrates through water only from the lithosphere to the hydrosphere. On the land phosphorus is assimilated from the soil by plants, is used by plants and animals for their life processes and after mineralisation of the organic substances enters the soil again in the form of phosphates. The greatest part of this phosphorus is
absorbed again by the root system of the plants, but the other part can be washed away by precipitation and then transported to water basins. As already mentioned, large phosphorus reserves have been accumulated in the Earth's crust during past geological times and a part of them gradually passes into the soil, when another part is used for phosphorus fertilizers and is also transferred to the soil, but finally a great share of this phosphorus enters the hydrosphere. There phosphates are used by the phytoplankton and the related organisms at different levels of the complex trophic path. Considerable amounts of phosphorus are practically "excluded" from the biological cycle into ocean due to their deposition at great depths. Only a small part of the phosphorus returns to the lithosphere, exclusively in a biological manner. The anthropogenic activity is an important factor for the increase of the phosphorus content in water and on the land due to the wide application of phosphorus fertilizers, polyphosphate detergents and the biological treatment of the polluted household and industrial wastewater. This leads to the considerable eutrophication of the water basins.
Nitrogen cycle and nitrogen content in surface water

Nitrogen is a gas with no colour and odour, and slightly soluble in water under normal conditions. Its content in the Earth's crust amounts to only 0.04 % by mass but it represents the main component part of the atmosphere: 75.6 % of the mass or 78.1 % of the volume. Figure 3.4 Nitrogen cycle The nitrogen cycle (Figure 3.4) in nature is realized by different organisms, for which nitrogen is of vital importance, due to the fact that it is an indispensable component of such extremely necessary compounds as chlorophyll, haemoglobin, desoxyribonucleic acid, etc. Animals and plants cannot assimilate directly atmospheric nitrogen but plants can use it in the form of dissolved nitrates in soils by their root system. After a number of chemical reactions the nitrogen in then is bound with other elements until nucleic acids and proteins are obtained. Proteins are exactly in the form in which nitrogen can be used by the higher organisms. The complex nitrogen compounds comprised in the animal wastes decay under the action of bacteria to relatively simple compounds of the group of the ammonia and the ammonium salts - ammonification. Another group of bacteria processes these compounds to nitrates that are easy again for assimilation by plants - nitrification, thus closing the cycle. In addition to this cycle, certain amounts of the atmospheric nitrogen are bound ("fixed") during thunderstorms or by bacteria in the roots of leguminous plants. Moreover, a part of the nitrates on the land can be carried away by
surface water to the ocean and after deposition on the bottom it leaves the nitrogen cycle. However, a part of these nitrates can return again to the land by means of the trophic path: phytoplankton fish zooplankton birds. A certain type of bacteria - denitrificating ones - are capable of decomposing the ammonium
compounds and as a result gaseous nitrogen is released as a by-product, which can no longer be assimilated by the organisms - denitrification.

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Phosphorus cycle and phosphorus content in surface water

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